The Swift Red Fox
by TrueSeven
Summary: Spike deals with events from ep 6x19 and recalls a tragic event from his childhood.


DISCLAIMER: I do not own these characters. Joss Whedon does Poetry is from "The Cloud" by P.B. Shelley

SPOILER WARNING: Vague details from 6.19, "Seeing Red". Story occurs between events in this episode.

SUMMARY: Spike deals with events from 6.19 and recalls an episode from his childhood. Decidedly non-cannon.

RATING: PG-13, no sexual content, language and graphic violence

NO PORTION OF THIS STORY MAY BE USED WITHOUT THE CONSENT OF THE AUTHOR

To contact the author either e.mail: truergirlyahoo dot com.

The Swift Red Fox 

He ran out the door. It was still open wide from his abrupt entrance. The air outside was cold. He could smell the coming rain.

"Fuck, fuck, I didn't just do that. I'm not…" He ran.

Spike was crying. It had been at least a hundred years since actual tears had come and the ache from sobbing was intense, almost beautiful. Pain bloomed inside him again and again like a yellow bruise-colored sunset. He stumbled through the streets, glancing upward, cursing the demon inside him, cursing that which disallowed him an audience with God. If he could, he would pray first for forgiveness, then for death.

He'd gone to Buffy's house today, swallowed his pride, wanting only to touch her, to be with her. She was his blonde narcotic, an overwhelming release. He needed her, so he went get his fix and she was disgusted. It had been ages since Spike had seen his reflection, but when he threw wide the bathroom door; Buffy's eyes were a mirror, a glass revealing exactly how pathetic he was, bringing his every weakness to light. Without a word, she had devastated him. He'd come to her, this time, for more than just a shag, but she would never, never know. The bitch hurt him, so he hurt her worse.

He couldn't stop running, searching for escape. Spike longed for his lungs to sting with cold air and exhaustion, his muscles to cramp into tight thick knots. He wanted his body to burn, he begged to be punished. Spike wondered if she was angry enough to chase him, to come without warning, a stake wrapped in her fist, he wondered if she would shove it into his chest, if she would involuntarily let him inside her, breathing the dust he would become. He'd give anything for her to punch him, to break his nose, make him bleed. When she was pounding the shit out of him, he would know she was alright, that her heart was still beating. If she was knocking his teeth out, at least she'd be touching him.

Spike closed his eyes. He tried to forget her face, how she had looked feral for a moment, terrorized, cornered. He willed the image to leave him and when it wouldn't he scratched at his lids, punched himself until his eyes were black, swollen shut. His tears were cold, face streaked with blood and dirt and despair. He dug into his pale thigh, tore at his hair. He raged, ripping at his flesh with fingernails and teeth until his wrist was meaty pulp. Purple blue bite marks rose from the clean shirtwhite of his skin. This was his penance, his regret, grief…and it wasn't nearly enough. There was no absolution for him, no forgiveness for a monster who longed for humanity or a man who had never ceased to be a monster.

When he thought there were no more tears, Spike settled in a dark place, a large hollow log surrounded by fine, tall grass. He reached into his pocket, wrapped his bloody wrist in a sky blue scarf Buffy left in his bed, brought his hands in close and covered his face. Spike could smell her, his flesh warm under the softly knotted silk. Buffy smelled like autumn, like the taut green skin of ripened apples, of cinnamon and rising dough.

So, so long ago, his mother had watched him kneed a dense, sticky lump of bread dough.

"You're doing a wonderful job, William. See, work is good for the soul."

He had asked to play chase with the other boys outside, but she had refused, swatting him smartly with a leather strap when he persisted. Mother had taught him a lesson. William now knew that little boys must obey. He pressed the heels of his tiny hands into the dough, straining his skinny arms to tame the uncooperative mass. Outside, the children were laughing. He heard Malcolm call the others to help him chase a red fox that had run into the woods. William had seen the fox once. He had been hanging laundry with Mother, when he spied the glossy tail disappear into the tree line. He followed without a sound, trailing the fox to a wiry ravine, watching it silently slink into a log then out of sight. When he emerged from the woods, trousers torn at the knee, he was punished. Mother had needed his help, she said. He was not to traipse off into the woods again. William was sorry he'd made her angry. He hugged at her legs and kissed her fingers, he begged her forgiveness, but she was stone. There were 5 lashes with the strap after dinner, then straight to bed.

William lay aching in his bed that night, the stinging weight of a thin white sheet pressed against the tender welts. He waited, eyes slits, to hear the steady breath of sleep from Mother's room. He quietly reached for the bound paper and charcoal pencil his nanny, Miranda had given him and drew a portrait of a pretty red fox slipping into a hollowed log, before he drifted off to sleep.

Mother was sobbing again. William, still in his bed clothes, fetched her silver handled hair brush and rushed to the sitting room. Wordlessly, he ran the bristles through her auburn curls.

"Good boy, Willie, good boy," she whispered, "you know just how to make your Mummy feel happy."

William sat at her feet, smoothing the crimson skirts around him, "Are you sad that Father is gone?" he asked, "I miss him, Mum. Still…"

William's mother leaned forward, opened her arms. The little boy had waited so long for her to reach out to him, to hold him close, hug him tightly. After Father left, Mother had told him not to cry and he hadn't. Though he missed his Father terribly, William had been a good boy, a very strong boy. He never spoke of the night when Father left with Miranda, when Mother threw the fire poker at them and screamed how she hoped they'd die. He never spoke a word of it, just as Mother had insisted. Instead, William filled his time comforting her. He brushed her hair, presented her with limericks and riddles and rubbed her hands with lavender perfumed lotion. Mother's kindnesses were spent on bottles of milky green tonic for easing pain and William was left to his own devises. Mother said little boys were not to be coddled.

He skittered into her lap; arms outstretched reaching for her face, smiling. Mother's countenance was hard, the deep lines around her mouth collapsed, stretched as she shrieked at the boy.

"You disgusting brat, you are not to speak of…"

He closed his eyes, readying himself for pain. She slammed the flat metal of the hairbrush into his cheek, neck, back. William watched as clumps of his hair floated like feathers as she tore at him. She kicked him, knocking the air from his lungs, as he gasped, she slapped his beautiful face, reminded him he had no father to mourn.

"Bastard. Parasite. That whore would never have set foot in this house, but for you."

She punctuated each word, pounding a coiled fist into his chest. When the silver brush had lost its fire, she raised a heavy glass decanter. William whimpered, pleaded. She threw it against the red brick of the fireplace. He watched the streams of liquid flow down the smooth floorboards, disappear into the imperceptible cracks and when it was all gone, the boy finally allowed himself the luxury of tears.

Mother couldn't stop, didn't stop, until she was silent, spent, curled sleeping on the floor.

William tiptoed into her bedchamber, found the gold framed mirror and stared intently at his own eyes, then he wiped away the blood and tears. His finger twisted at a strange angle, throbbing, purple. He wrapped it in a scrap of linen, busied his mind reciting poetry, the pulsing pain as his metronome.

I am the daughter of earth and water,

And the nursling of the sky;

I pass through the pores of the ocean and shores;

I change, but I cannot die.

For after the rain when with never a stain,

The pavilion of heaven is bare,

And the winds and sunbeams with their convex gleams,

Build up the blue dome of air,

I silently laugh at my own cenotaph,

And out of the caverns of rain,

Like a child from the womb, like a ghost from the tomb,

I arise and unbuild it again.

William buttoned his heavy wool jacket, slid past Mother's sleeping body and through the open door. He climbed into the lowest branches of the ash tree, wondered if he should kill his mother or return to the house, cover her with blankets and sleep close, her breath warm on his neck. He could see the fox creeping through the brush and into the ravine. He followed her and when she slipped into the log and he could no longer see her, he cried. William fell asleep in the leaves, his head on the hollow log, waiting for the sleek red beast to return, waiting for the ache to heal.

Spike tightened the scarf around his bleeding wrist, used the free edge to wipe the blood from his nose, mouth. He closed his eyes to sleep. He was tired, tired of waiting for the beast to return, so, so tired of waiting for the ache to heal.


End file.
